Dating Thread 199 - Come on 2021....

[LongtimelurkerL]

The Rules:

1. The first rule about the dating thread is don't talk about it with people you're dating.
2. Develop a thick skin.
3. Do not invest emotionally too soon.
4. It's all BS until it actually happens.
5. Trust your gut instinct.
6. People vanishing, lying & being generally weird is not your fault.
7. Know your worth.
8. If it's not fun, stop.
9. Loo update is mandatory.

10. No dating the thread. 11. Treat others as you'd like to be treated 12. Any relationship you have that could get ruined by having a conversation about your feelings, standards and/or expectations wasn't really stable enough to begin with 13. The things you choose to ignore/ tolerate now are the reasons you will break up in the future 14. OLD can get very time consuming. Keep doing other activities you enjoy.

Optional: Please give your irons (potential dates you are talking to) nicknames like Mr Scottish. Initials are allowed (Mr S) when you are an item

Gah, cross-posted @TheCatWithTheHat - sorry about Miss Spark. I hope you can reach out to friends/family and meet up with someone this weekend for statutory exercise, it sounds like you need a friendly face to share some time with.

@Eesha I feel a bit judged if I'm honest, and disappointed. I explained it was a one-off to try it to fulfil a fantasy for both of us, and while I'd be open to it if a partner wanted to go, I had no real urge to do it again. Box ticked, t-shirt got etc...

I don't think it will stop me sharing with people in the future - we've all got a past, and it's better to find out someone isn't a match earlier rather than later.

@Slothmomma that's a shame about your iron. It's a long hard slog at times isn't it...

@ThisTooShallBeFantastic yep, I do seem to get attached to women who aren't a good long term match, and then struggle to move on. I hope I'm learning though. One of these days I'll figure it out. I'm probably going to pop in and visit my mum this weekend as I've not seen her for over a month, and they always make things better.

Glad to hear things are going well with your Mr GN!

@TheCatWithTheHat personally I felt with normal dating, I had to show a pristine version of myself to meet someone decent. Never did though!

@ThisTooShallBeFantastic thank you for your lovely words. Things do feel a bit easier as days go by. I do wonder sometimes whether he misses me at all. Last time he messaged, he went into great detail about being really down about his autism etc, that was a few days ago. Today I was thinking am I ever going to get intimate with anyone again!!!? The Mr Unavailable book has given me a good few insights though. Not really any pattern in my choices but I can see bits which resonate. I do wonder if normality exists though out there though in a relationship for me.

@TheCatWithTheHat that’s disappointing. It’s not like you were asking her to go to swingers clubs with you. On the other hand maybe she was afraid that it was something you were into and knows she wouldn’t be so decided to end it before it started. I know if an iron told me he has been to a swingers club I might feel like I wasn’t enough for him because it’s not something I would be into and I’d be constantly wondering if he really wanted that type of relationship.
It does seem like you haven’t indicated that to Ms spark and her saying your moral compasses don’t align is judgy.
@ThisTooShallBeFantastic your day with Mr GN does indeed sound fantastic😉 what a lovely surprise!
Mr TG is coming to mine tomorrow night and I’m really excited to see him. I’ve gotten him a little gift and card for Valentine’s Day and am contemplating cooking dinner but I hate cooking for people so might chicken out of that

Downloaded bumble tonight and I'm shocked...I wouldn't class myself as being too fussy but I've literally swiped right on one person and he didn't match back by the looks of it. Do people rate bumble?

@havecourage8bekind i had a look at bumble and definitely think it's gone quite downhill. It's become a lot more like tinder but pretending to be a higher class of man! Not sure where the slightly better irons are hanging out. Is there a new app that I haven't heard of?

@eesha I think I will be deleting it...I've wasted an hour of my life swiping! I didn't know whether I'm just being too fussy but my god there's so many men that are clearly lying about their age, profiles full of pictures of their kids (I actually would like a man with children, but do their dating profiles need to show the poor kids!?), Filters on grown men, posing etc. Just show me your smiley face pls!!

@TheCatWithTheHat
Unfortunately swingers clubs have a reputation of debauchery and everyone having unprotected sex when of course the reality is quite different in the majority of clubs.

A long term FWB of mine told me he wasn't comfortable with me going to swingers clubs and as I would likely have unprotected sex he wasn't prepared to see me again.
I wished him well and ended contact, a week later he apologised and wanted to see me.
I told him where to go as I felt judged, I would never have unprotected sex with a stranger and I thought he knew me better than that. And he would be happy to come to clubs with me - too late pal.

I have been to a club with another FWB and probably would again in the future if the need was there. I only went because it was on my bucket list before I turned 40.

I'm not sure if I'd tell an iron I'd been to one as I dont feel it defines me or my sexual preferences and people easily judge.

@havecourage8bekind

Downloaded bumble tonight and I'm shocked...I wouldn't class myself as being too fussy but I've literally swiped right on one person and he didn't match back by the looks of it. Do people rate bumble?

It's not immediate, he might not have seen your profile. It doesn't show you people you've matched with decide on.

@havecourage8bekind I'm on Bumble, as well as a few others and I've had mixed results. I've been swiping a bit the last few days, and my experience has been similar to yours. However other times it's been much better - it may be worth leaving it a day or two and trying again. Sometimes I think they make you work for it, and you have to sift through all the unpopular profiles before you get to the good ones.

I've had more matches and dates than from Tinder, but it's still very tough going. It's hard to get a match, and even when I do they often don't get in touch.

My favourite is Hinge, and that's where I've had most of my matches and dates.

I've tried OKCupid too, but didn't really get on with it. I even paid extra to see my likes, as I had 200+ within a few days - only to find most of them were from countries like Kenya and the Philippines! Waste of money IMO, and I've only had a couple of matches, and no dates.

As for the swinging thing - I've only done it the once, and did explain it was a one-off and we didn't actually do much there. I think next time I'll leave that conversation until we know each other a little better. She actually said the thought of it made her feel sick, so it wasn't that she felt she might not be adventurous enough. Oh well - on with the search!

Actually what I've noticed with Bumble (from when I used to pay for the option to view who liked me) is that if someone liked me, it shows me their profile in the normal feed fairly soon. So the chances are, he'll see you at some point if he's swiping but he won't know you've liked him (unless he's paid extra), so it's only if he swipes on you that you'll match.

I'm pretty sure that both Bumble and Tinder push people who've liked you near to the top of the pack. Tinder seem to have a new upselling trick lately where the first profile you have when opening the app after a short period of inactivity will be a straight 10/10 and you will get a popup which reads along the lines of "they're really popular, buy "Super Likes" to be more visible.

I've not really noticed much difference between Bumble and Tinder really, apart from who has to message first. The big issue for me is that the userbase on Bumble is much smaller and you run out of people sooner. This is an issue for me because I'm in a semi-rural area so there's not a massive pool anyway. Despite this I keep quite a small radius (20 miles or so) because otherwise I get swamped by profiles from a conurbation which might be 25 miles as the crow flies but is 50 miles by road. With the current restrictions, anyone not really local might be waiting a while before we are allowed to meet anyway.

Talking of which (as I'm going to step out from lurking on this thread), I did match with a local woman (whom we shall call "Miss G") last week. Seemed to go well to start with, messaging was infrequent but usually at the same time each day (usually before she would start her shifts or occasionally at midnight/1am), she would sometimes initiate a conversation rather than it purely being a one-way effort as I've found with some matches.

We even agreed to meet up for a walk with her dog. At the eleventh hour though, she asked to put it off until the next day, though the weather turned out to be wet so I didn't push to meet up then. Since then though, while she has responded to photos I've sent on Snapchat (innocuous stuff: snow at work, a horse in a local field, the sea view from home etc.), anything about fixing another time to go for a walk or even to have a zoom call has been met with silence. Not a "I'm at work this evening", "I don't feel like it today" or "I'm just not interested". It's just radio silence though if I post about something else then she does respond to that. If she's not interested in meeting up at all, I'd rather be told, and if she is interested but doesn't have the time right now or wants to continue messaging for a bit longer before meeting up, again I'd prefer to know where I stand.

God let this pandemic be over so that singles' events can restart. I find that a three minute conversation whether in real life, over the phone, or on a video chat helps you get to know far more about each other than weeks of fragmented messages.

Good morning all, I’m a lurker on here mostly but everything we all talk about has happened to me. Ghosting, flakiness, liars, stalkers and married men....I could go on
I’m currently not swiping as I’ve really not got the heart for it and the general February feeling is one of sadness.
4th single valentines coming up and it’s really difficult to ignore it all. Single in a worldwide pandemic has to be the worst.
I just wonder where all the normal decent men are?
If anyone knows ??

@Techgirldating welcome 👋

I think if any of us knew the answer to that we wouldn't be here 😆

It's just so awful....I had a look on the Facebook dating, I'm getting absolutely sick of nearly every man saying " own house and teeth". Well bloody done, I have my own house too but don't need to advertise it. Just why!!!!

All of them are awful, tongues out in the mirror, taking selfies in bed half naked.

I think there must be a better way than this but I'm not sure what...think I need a miracle.

I had a browse on Bumble the other day and the pickings seemed much as ever. The problem surely is lockdown distorting everything? Can’t really meet, stir crazy, lots of marriages on their last legs and people testing the waters. I feel that by the summer things will have changed a lot, a whole new crop.

@ThisTooShallBeFantastic you might have a point with the married people. I've had a few which I suspect are married, simply due to messaging really early or at lunch. Or saying they live 5min from their ex plus sleep at 9pm. All very strange out there.

It's much the same from the other side of the fence - so many profiles with animal face filters, group shots, shots with kids... lots of ghosting, and general flakiness. It's all very depressing, especially at the moment.

Then when you do find someone you like the look of, who seems normal and decent - they don't swipe back.

And when you finally meet someone who you click with and have a good time with, they decide after x months that they're not ready for a relationship.

I'm feeling rather down about the whole thing to be honest.

It is utterly depressing, isn't it. The new trend I've discovered is suddenly a lot of photos of legs. Like someone lying down and taking a photo of their hairy legs and feet. Why? Is it because you haven't caught a big fish to pose with? Or a tattooed grandchild?

Comms with Mr Nuclear have gone down. He seems to work a lot. He was too far away to meet with anyway so meh.

Luckily I don't give a shit about Valentine's. Never really have. Never expected anything on that day from anyone so never disappointed. Birthdays are my you'd-better-make-an-effort time.

Sorry cat, so disappointing. But if she's going to judge you for exploring a fairly vanilla fantasy with a consenting adult then what else would she be judgy about? Damn though 😪

Still not a peep from latest iron. I know some think not hearing for a day or so isn't such a big deal but I still think however busy you find yourself, if you were genuinely interested, it would take 2 mins to drop a text saying you're busy. I would normally send a "nice chatting with you, hope you find what you're after" type text for closure but i just can't be bothered any more so will just unmatch on app, delete from contacts and delete the WhatsApp thread. Slim pickings on apps at moment though so no other irons yet

I liken it to looking for a unicorn.
If you match, conversation is decent, agree to meet, meet and it a mutual like for more than a few dates it still leads to “I’m not ready for a relationship” or some other excuse. Last iron, 3 months of chat 5 dates and some sleepovers then the I’m not ready story... seriously took 3 months to decide that? Just about the time I let my guard down and thought yep this could be something. Literally give up

@bangheadhere40 Wait, I’m supposed to mention I have a house and teeth 🤦‍♂️ ? 4 years, I’ve been doing this. 4 years ! And now I find out about the house and teeth thing. What next !? That I drive a car to work !?

@HairyArsedMan lots mention cars too so probably yes 😅 if you can also tell women that you don't tolerate drama or crazy exes then even better!

Might write my profile like these men as a piss take....Will pick up a huge fish from asda when I'm next there and put that on my photos too.

So bloody depressing.

@Techgirldating I've had exactly the same thing a couple of times! Once she even told me I was her Tinder unicorn, her soulmate etc... then after several months I got the "I'm not ready for a relationship".

I've just been reading through the other thread about what puts people off profiles. Thankfully I've avoided all the cliches, yet still getting very few responses. Maybe, despite what people say here, the fish and beer photos actually work?

How about this for a photo idea - me standing topless on a sportscar parked outside a house, biting into a huge fish with my own teeth, holding a payslip and a beer in my other hand, and then another one with me and my ex (badly photoshopped out) with "no drama or crazy psychos please" written above it.

That should do it, shouldn't it? That'll be like Tinder catnip!

@TheCatWithTheHat

No, Here’s how it’s done in the gentlemanly way

I think I’ll wait a couple weeks or till I’m bored and curious then repeek on the apps quickly.

We have snow/ice so though I’m enjoying walking in it ( beautiful) I’m not really sure what it means for outdoor dates

Is that where I've been going wrong? I'd better pop down to ASDA for some Captain Birdseye fish fingers to pose with.

Should the "own house and teeth" be backed up by proof? Deeds and a reference from a dentist?